Howard and all Beautifully put, and for the most part, agrees with what I believe to be true. One difference being the "translation" of the first name of Lijntjen Theissen. My main source for this info is "The Descendants of Paulus and Gertrud Kusters" by Jean White. The Kuster Book quotes some of the same sources you do, Howard. Do you own this book? If not I will check it for a reference of an original source listing Lijntijen, as Lijntijen Theisson. An email I just sent to Sandy is below: FYI from the book "The Descendants of Paulus and Gertrude Kusters" Jean White editor. Keep in mind Gertrude Doors m. Paulus Kusters was the sister of Helene Theissen m. Thones Kunders. With the naming patterns not yet established in the days of these peoples birth, siblings did not always use the same last name. Some were "modernizing" the way names came down and used the actual last name of their father, others used the old Dutch naming pattern. This is the best an ignorant person such as myself can explain the difference in one family for kids to ends up with different last names. Now I quote from "Kusters" book: " Gertrude Doors was born about 1648 in Kaldenkirchen, the daughter of Theiss (Mathew) and Nees (Agnes) Doors. Many earlier genealogies of the Kuster family speak of Gertrude Streypers as the wife of Paulus Kuster. This misconception was probably passed along for many years because of the article appearing in The Pennsylvania magazine of History and Biography in 1880 by Samuel W. Pennypacker, "The Settlement of Germantown, and the Causes Which Led to It," saying that Gertrude was a sister of Jan and Willem Streypers. She was in fact the sister-in-law of Jan/Johann Streypers, her sister, Anna, having married him. The term "sister" has changed through the years and in the 1600's "sister" could refer to a child of the same parents, to his brother's remarried widow, to the wife of a brother of his own wife (or as in this case to as sister of his own wife), as well as to a child of his stepmother. Gertrude's father, Theiss Doors, baptized 12 September 1614 in the Catholic Church in Kaldenkirchen, was the son of Peter Dohrs/Doormans and Lysgen (Elizabeth) Griets. Theiss' name appears in an article about the persecution and suffering of the Mennonites in the Jurlich-Berg Historical Journal under the surname Dahrs, Dahrmans, Peters and Peterschen which indicates that his father's name was Peter. Surnames in this period of time were not set. In fact, surnames were not required in the Netherlands (Kaldenkirchen lies almost on the border with the Netherlands) until 1811. Many families adopt surnames around the 16th and 17th centuries. Thus, with Theiss' and Ness' children one will note that some of the children used their father's surname of Doors while several used the patronymic of Theisson." etc Barb Locker